Wells Fargo CFO Discusses Investment Banking Growth

Dec 20, 2011

In a recent interview with TheStreet, Wells Fargo CFO Tim Sloan offered his thoughts on the surprising success of the company's investment banking business.

According to the news source, while industry leaders such as JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America have seen struggling investment banking segments, Wells Fargo has experienced the other end of the spectrum.

Asked about a note from JPMorgan analyst Vivek Juneja saying investment banking and capital markets was the fastest-growing business for Wells Fargo as far as revenue goes, Sloan admitted that may be somewhat of a stretch.

"Vivek's a great guy, but I don't think that's exactly correct," Sloan noted. "For example, as we highlighted - without spending too much time on that point - the mortgage business today is doing incredibly well and as we mentioned just because of the refinance activity going on right now will probably be a very fast-growing business as we speak," he added, before noting it probably isn't necessarily the fastest-growing.

Sloan's comments come as Bank of Ireland recently decided to sell its London-based lending division Burdale to Wells Fargo for approximately 690 million euros, according to Reuters.